Felitti wondered if she might be subconsciously protecting herself from what must have seemed like a recurring trauma by gaining weight. What if he had been looking at this all wrong? He, as a doctor, had perceived a patient’s weight to be the problem. What if it was actually a solution? What if his patient’s weight was a psychological and emotional barrier, something protecting her from harm? That would go a long way toward explaining why his most successful patients, the ones who had peeled off that protective layer, were so desperate to put it back on.
